My focus is on narratives with a teaching or tradition embedded within
The Seven Grandfathers, The Four Directions
The repeating lines, connecting us to Mother Earth, the Sky, the Water and the Spirit Realms
Turtle Island | Creation Story
2024
This is part of a celestial series linking the water and the spirit realms with the sky realm. The spirit is a traveller transcending time and space and spirit. The traveller is a link to the ancestors and the connections we hold to the sky, the land, and the water.

Otter
2025

Water Spirit
2025

Legend of the Loon and the Stars (revisited)
2025

Wabooz
2025

Dreams of Nature, Guiding Me
2024
This is a self-portrait, based on my dreams and my connections to the natural world, which has always had a major impact to my creative spirit. Being in an urban environment, where I currently live, I feel less connected to nature and to the land, this drives the inclusion and exploration of nature in my art.

Mooz Manitou
2024
This artwork was inspired by a vision I had during a Shakey tent ceremony. I saw many things, including a mooz manitou. This work is meant to honour that experience and our mooz relations. It also makes connections of the spirit and sky realms, and highlights the mooz constellation (Pegasus, Lacerta) which is visible in the harvest sky.

Woodland Dreamer
2024

Nanabozho: Transformation(s)
2024

Star Woman
2024

Go Smudge Yourself
2024

Miskwaadesi All The Way Down
2024

Loon Family
2025

Loon Family
2024

Diving Through a Doorway
2023
Sky & Spirit Realms:
Through the stars & sky above,
Through the rivers & waters below,
They are the gateways to our ancestors.

Nanabozho
2023
In this piece the ancestors are in a celestial setting, and they are manifesting the spirit Nanabozho through the oral tradition, and he is seen through the vibrations of the sound waves made. waves of oral tradition
Full Moon of March: Awakening
2023
Anishinaabeg Florals, 2025

Language of Our Ancestors
2022
This piece shows the deeply rooted traditions passed to us from our ancestors, seen as spirits growing in the roots of a strawberry plant. The knowledge is growing though to the seeds who are sharing it with physical realm through the strawberry plant.
Copyright © 2025 Tessa Shank